Continued xpansion.
Google's ChatGPT rival Bard launches in Europe and Brazil
Published By Shiona McCallum, Technology reporter
Google's parent company Alphabet is rolling out its artificial intelligence chatbot Bard in Europe and Brazil. It is the product's biggest expansion since its March launch in the US and the UK and heats up the rivalry with Microsoft's ChatGPT ... '
Seen this demonstrated recently
Deere Seeks Satellite Network to Connect Far-Flung Farms
By The Wall Street Journal, May 5, 2023, Credit: Bianca Flowers/Reuters
A Deere driverless tractor.
Deere needs widespread connectivity, especially in rural areas, for its autonomous tractors.
Farm-equipment company Deere aims to network farms in remote regions of Brazil and the U.S. via satellites as it deploys sophisticated machinery and software for more rapid sowing and harvesting of crops.
Company executives said Deere requires widespread connectivity to maintain driverless tractors and to update intelligent crop sprayers.
Deere said its satellite network will transmit signals to Brazilian farms and remote U.S. areas where Wi-Fi is unavailable.
It expects to choose a satellite operator later this year and to start marketing the satellite service to growers by the end of next year.
The company aims to add 1 million farm and construction machines to its cloud-based operations center by 2026; Deere's Jonny Spendlove said up to 100,000 of those machines would be linked through satellites.
From The Wall Street Journal
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An agriculture rea I worked in, some details here, will dig somewhat deeper.
Morning Coffee Tech By Luana Ferreira in the BBC Business reporter, Brazil
For an estimated one billion people around the world drinking coffee is a daily regime.
Yet what many coffee lovers might not know is that they are often drinking a brew made, at least in part, from Brazilian beans.
"Brazilian beans have popular characteristics, and are known for their body and sweetness," says Christiano Borges, boss of the country's largest grower, Ipanema Coffees.
"Therefore, many coffee blends in the world use our coffee as a base."
Brazil is far and away the world's largest grower of coffee beans. It accounts for more than one third of all global supplies, or 37% in 2020, to be exact. In second place is Vietnam with 17% of supplies.
Some 70% of Brazil's coffee plants are the highly-priced arabica species, used in fresh coffee. The remaining 30% are robusta, which is used primarily for instant coffee.
Brazil's largest coffee plantations stretch for miles on end
The problem for Brazil, and world coffee supplies in general, is that last year the country's annual crop plummeted by almost a quarter due to a drought across its main coffee growing region, which centres on the south-eastern states of Minas Gerais, São Paulo and Paraná., The knock-on affect has been a global reduction in coffee beans supplies, and a subsequent doubling in wholesale prices since this time last year.
To try to alleviate any future falls in production, Brazil's largest coffee producers are increasingly turning towards technology to help them successfully grow and process the best possible crop, both in terms of size and quality., One such firm, Okuyama, says it is now investing at least 10% of its revenues in technology. Based in Minas Gerais, it has coffee plantations covering 1,100 hectares (2,718 acres).
Its staff use a computer app called Cropwise Protector, which is made by Swiss-Chinese agricultural tech firm, Syngenta., Linked to ground sensors and satellite imagery, the tool gives the farm workers a visual analysis of the farm, or plantation, on a tablet device or laptop.
They can then quickly apply such things as drip-irrigation, or pest-control, to a very specific area that might need it, rather than a whole field or the entire farm. ... '
Visited Brazil to outline their retail technology advances. Especially regarding food supply chains. Was impressed with their efforts. Now they have established an AI Center
Brazil Launches AI Center By ZDNet
Brazil's Artificial Intelligence Center (C4AI) officially launched earlier this month, thanks to investments from IBM and Brazil’s São Paulo Research Foundation and University of Sao Paulo.
The center will work to address challenges related to health, the environment, the food production chain, the future of work, and the development of Natural Language Processing technologies in Portuguese (the language spoken by nearly all Brazilians).
C4AI also will work on human well-being improvement projects and diversity and inclusion initiatives. The center's opening comes nearly a year after the Brazilian government announced plans to create a national AI strategy. ... "
